Is decluttering a true benefit?

I was cleaning up my email inbox and you know how it is! You start cleaning, so in my case I was batch working on my Pinterest post programming and that’s how I came across this pin from Carly of the blog Mommy on Purpose.

Everybody knows that : Time is money! but nobody thinks of it has money not well spent when there looking for there keys, the kids toy, book or else. Space has a cost too !!! For sure, when you think of an organized space you feel liberated, free and even joyous, but in order to get to those you need to :

Toss

Keep

Give

Recycle

But also :

To organize

Put a system in place

To file

To dust

Make it clear

To be rigorous to maintain it.

The easiest way is to tackle one room at a time and to organize the spaces that are out of sight first like wardrobe, desk drawers, commode, cabinets. When this task is done the clutter in an actual room generally will be tidy up with the new system in place. If the clutter still remains the main reason is most of the time because this clutter shouldn’t be in this specific room (sport equipment laying around instead of the garage or the mudroom) or because the clutter hasn’t a space for it in the room or the routine habit isn’t in place yet. Let’s say that you complain of the clothes laying on the ground of the kids room. Why not put in place a rewarding system or a simple routine where kids and all humans in the household enter the bathroom fully clothed and let’s the dirty clothes in the hamper before the shower or bath time. If this routine takes effect and is respected you won’t run everywhere to find all the clothes. The full hamper will tell you when to do the laundry and you’ll be able to manage your time more efficiently.

One of my favorite tip is this : don’t go crazy over everything and instead of stoping regularly to switch task I love to batch tasks! What do I mean? Easy, instead of doing the accounting one invoice at a time or filing one paper at a time or email cleaning each time it dings, I prefer to :

Gather all the invoices for a week (in a box or in a magazine box or a big Ziplock bag) and each Friday morning it’s accounting time

Gather all the filing papers and filed them once a week

In regard to the email cleaning :

Once in the morning and once at night

I go in my email box and discard every spam or not good email

Respond to customer request

Archive for later potential email for my future blog posts or courses and even for my website

The rest is tackle once per month, when I take the time to read an email from a specific sender and decide if this sender is someone I want to read, the content is adequate and will be good for my business. If not, I unsubscribe is Newsletter

It’s true that by decluttering, your todo list will be less stressfull and more manageable. But appart from the “That’s the last time I search for my keys” situation to remedy, I prefer to make a game plan to declutter. Put in my calendar 1 hour or 1 day to tackle one room or one task that bugs me. I have a morning routine and a night routine.

Morning schedule :

Wake up

Start the pre-prepared laundry load

Make a run through every room :

Make beds,

Grab everything that doesn’t belong in each room out

Close every open closet doors or drawers

Open the curtains (If you don’t want anyone to look inside your house it means that you need to tackle the things that bothers you!)

Empty the dishwasher while preping the breakfast and starting the lunches

Before leaving wash every counters and the dinning table, breakfast nook, so when you come back from your full day or work day or even if you work from home, you’ll be ready to start supper and eat right away.

Night schedule :

Verify the doors, lights and night lights, the wake up clock and the next day weather

Pack and start the dishwasher

Put the last washed load in the dryer or hung to air dry and prepare a load for the morning (This way your clothes will be dry to be folded the next morning or put away. Also the ones in the prepared washer won’t stink because they’ve stayed to long in the machine and being wet.)

Prepare the clothes for the kids with the extra set just in case the weather isn’t the one expected

Prepare the bags for school, daycare or activities and leave them all by the exiting door (This is a time saver! You’re not stressed out and at the last minute looking for the soccer shoes or forgot to clean the soccer uniform.)

Prepare the non perishable lunch and snacks (Leave the lunch box open on the counter to receive the perishable and last decision products to throw in them.) Don’t forget the napkins, utensils and icepack for the warmer weather!

Also wash every counters and the dining table, breakfast nook, so when you’ll wake up, you’ll be ready to start the breakfast and lunches and eat right away.

Please find your own way and put it to work! Mine works for me but it doesn’t mean that yours is bad.